Cancer For One, Cancer For All

October 21, 1988|By Reviewed by Harry Mark Petrakis, an author whose ``Collected Stories`` appeared last year.

Of Tears and Triumphs

By Georgia and Bud Photopulos

Congdon & Weed, 189 pages, $16.95

In the introduction to this moving and informative book, Georgia Photopulos and her husband, Bud, write: ``This book is about surviving. Cancer is one of life`s awesome negatives, made more so by the attitudes of many who have it and many who treat it.

``But it can be dealt with. Our experience and those of thousands of others with whom we`ve worked show it can be done.``

The Chicago couple speak as battlers and survivors in a war that began for them in 1965, when Georgia developed bleeding in her breasts. Doctors at that time recommended every option from doing nothing to removing both breasts immediately.

Georgia chose to postpone surgery, and in 1968 the first of a series of malignant tumors was discovered in her breast.

She began a history of recurring hospitalizations, surgeries-including two mastectomies and unrelated brain surgery-radiation, chemotherapy and almost constant pain. Yet she survived and to an astonishing degree has prevailed.

After the initial diagnosis of cancer, the feelings of both husband and wife were similar to those of others assaulted by serious disease. They searched for doctors who were caring and who would provide as much information as possible, and they drew on the wellsprings of their faith in God. They tried to help their two children adjust, for if there is one thing made clear in this book, it is that when cancer strikes one member of the family, it strikes them all.

Instead of simply withdrawing into the posture of an invalid, Georgia, bolstered by Bud, resolved to fight. Through periods of terror and despair, when it appeared she would not survive, they sustained one another and were helped by loyal friends, a few good doctors, their parish priests. In her periods of recovery Georgia became a spirited advocate for cancer patients, appearing on radio programs and speaking at conferences across the country.

Along the way the Photopuloses learned things about themselves and about the arrogance and insensitivity of some members of the medical profession. There was also the constant pressure for money to meet the immense medical bills. For a while the family worked delivering thousands of telephone books. This is a pragmatic and dramatic book about survival, a war memoir that can and should be read not only by those who are ill but by those loved ones, family and friends who are touched by that illness.

The book also records a remarkable love story. In one passage Bud relate the point. It`s our closeness that brings us through trials together.``

Georgia and Bud Photopulos cannot control adversity, but they can and do remain steadfast to one another.

As their voices alternate throughout the book, the reader senses that these two have loved each other so long and so well that their hearts and spirits have indeed become one.